So I had my first run-in with the law here. On Sunday, Mr. Anantharaman worked with two workers washing sediment in the stream, while 10 kilometers away I collected sediment with two workers and our driver (Tirupathi). At the end of the day, Tirupathi drove us down the dirt road toward the village. Before we reached the village, we came upon a man dressed in slacks and a collared shirt, unlike the dress of most of the locals that we usually see in the fields. He waved us down in a way that clearly meant business. He spoke sternly in either Hindi or Tellagu, which Tirupathi simply translated to me as "man officer." Tirupathi tried to explain to the officer what we were doing and who we were with (Geological Survey of India), but the officer wasn't pacified.
He got in and ordered Tirupathi to drive us to his office in the nearby town. The officer slowly began addressing me in English, informing me that he was a Forest Service Officer, that we were illegally working on a Forest Preserve, and that collecting sediment or minerals on the Forest Preserve comes with a hefty fine. Great, that'll help my budget. This wasn't a complete surprise though; earlier that morning Mr. Anantharaman, in passing, had mentioned that the site was on a Forest Preserve but didn't make a big a deal about it. And various groups, including the GSI, have been collecting there for almost 20 years, so I figured we were okay. Wrong. To make matters worse, Tirupathi had incorrectly told the officer that Mr. Anantharaman worked for the ISI not the GSI or the Geological Survey of India. The ISI, as it turns out, is a Pakistani terrorist group. I had a little explaining to do ...
We arrived at his office and were quickly joined by 3 other officials. They sent Tirupathi back to retrieve Mr. Anantharaman. In the sparse office, I sat across from the officer (Vijay), while the others sat behind me and to my sides—not the most feng shui of arrangements. They did order me some chai though. There was a lot of discussion amongst themselves, cell phone conversations, and a series of questions trying to understand why we collected all that dirt (I get that a lot). Vijay showed me a map of the Forest Preserve and an official photocopy of the fines for various offenses—ours would be steep. As a last resort, I mentioned that there weren't any signs indicating the boundaries of the preserve. Too bad. As a show of willingness to comply, I asked whether I could have a copy of the map so that I avoided the same mistake next time. No dice.
My saving grace was that it took an hour and a half before Tirupathi returned with Mr. Anantharaman. After going over the logistics about the Forest Preserve, Vijay couldn't resist asking about my impressions of India. And in the course of exhausting all my Hindi and Tellagu words and all that I knew of Bollywood actors and actresses and Indian cricket bowlers and batsmen, Vijay and I actually managed to hit it off. He decided to drop the fines altogether and allowed us to continue working as long as we contact the main office next time. We took a ceremonial photograph to celebrate.